ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday addressed the nation and announced a “historic” relief package worth Rs120 billion rupees to provide essential commodities to twenty million families on subsidised rates.
The prime minister said he is announcing “the biggest welfare programme in Pakistan’s history” which would take the country towards becoming a welfare state. He said the team at the Ehsaas Welfare programme for the initiative.
“This package, which is worth Rs120 billion, will be offered to Pakistani by the federal and provincial governments,” he said. The prime minister announced that under the package, citizens can avail a 30% discount on three basic edible items including ghee, wheat, and pulses.
The prime minister said that considering that the masses are undergoing a tough time due to the inflation in the country, the government is introducing a package for 20 million families, which will benefit 130 million Pakistanis.
He thanked China, Saudi Arabia, and UAE for financially assisting Pakistan from defaulting before the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or else the rupee would have depreciated even further and inflation would have skyrocketed.
“We approached the IMF, we were stabilising the country for a year before corona came,” he said, lauding the National Command and Operations Centre (NCOC) for taking decisions that helped Pakistan fight against the coronavirus. “We were internationally acknowledged for being one of the few countries to deal with Covid-19 in the best manner,” he added.
The prime minister said the government made strategic decisions related to the imposition of a lockdown and saved factories from closing down during the pandemic. “We allowed construction industry to operate, we tried to save our exports because then the dollar would have gone up against the rupee,” he said.
He added that due to the government’s policies, rice production had gone up by 13.6%, corn 8%, sugarcane 22%, wheat 8%. He said engineering witnessed an increase of 350% in their profits, textile 163%, cars 131%, cement 113%, oil and gas 75%. “Our policies prevented the economy from collapsing,” he said.
Speaking about the ongoing inflation in the country, he said the government will have no choice but to increase the price of petrol. “Petrol is the cheapest in Pakistan, but we will have to increase the price because otherwise our deficit will increase and we will be further burdened by debt,” he added.
He said it is the media’s right to criticise the government but there should be a balanced approach when reporting on inflation. While citing the example of Turkey, Germany, China, and the United States, the prime minister said that these countries had also faced historic inflation after 2008.
The prime minister said multiple programs worth Rs260 billion are continuing under the umbrella of Ehsaas programme which are benefitting 20 million families.
He said massive funding of Rs14 billion rupees has been earmarked for Kamyab Pakistan Programme to support weaker segments of the society. He said loans to the tune of Rs30 billion have so far been disbursed to help youth earn their livelihoods.
PM Imran Khan said health card is one of the flagship projects under which treatment up to one million rupees is allowed to the card holder. He said entire population of Khyer Pakhtunkhwa has been provided with these health cards whilst this facility will be provided to the residents of Islamabad by December this year and to the entire population of Punjab by March next year.
